Complete lack of motivation

So, the past couple of days, I have had absolutely no motivation to paint, assemble, prime, or, in general, have anything to do with my collection of miniatures in the basement.  I did the test colors on some FSA & Planetfall figs, and I like it, and it's not too time-consuming, but I can't bring myself to sit down and work on them.  My Infinity figs are still sitting in the box, and I need to get them assembled if I am going to learn how to play this weekend.  I have some WM models that are actually very, very close to being finished, but no incentive to sit down and do them.

I'll force myself to go down and do some work, and maybe that will get the ball rolling.

The problems of being an altaholic.

So, my FLGS is going to start some different fall slow-grow leagues in the middle of next month.  Right now, there are plans for leagues in Malifaux, Warmahordes, Firestorm Armada, 40k and Infinity.  I plan on playing in 4 of them.

Fortunately, I already have the needed minis for everything.  I can play either Terrans or Directorate for FSA, anything I want for WM, Combined or Ariadna for Infinity, and more than a couple crews for Malifaux.

But I would like to have everything actually painted by the end of the league, which is the hard part.  I think I need to spend some time in the next few days assembling things, and maybe really learning how to play Infinity.  And brushing up my Malifaux rules.

There and back again

So, I missed close to 2 weeks because I was at the Shrine of the Mouse, aka Walt Disney World.  Always a good plan to escape the heat and humidity of a midwestern August by heading to a swamp in Florida.  I love it, but I could do without the 90+ degree heat and heat indexes of 110. 

But, despite a SNAFU on the part of the USPS, I came back to some minis - some Directorate ships for Firestorm Armada, and the Revenant models for SAGA.  With summer winding down and the kids heading back to school soon, I am hoping to really get some painting time in soon. 

But first, I have to catch up on the lawn and the laundry.

Back from GenCon

I (sorta) just got back from GenCon, and boy is my wallet empty.  I did not buy everything that I wanted to, only because some of it was sold out almost immediately.  I did manage to exercise some restraint - I had a shopping list planned, and I generally stuck to it.  I'll make a longer post later today; I've only just woken up, and the coffee has yet to really kick in.

Only one more sleep to GenCon

I leave for GenCon tomorrow - a solid four days of working at the booth, spending way too much money, getting no sleep, seeing friends, losing (and sometimes winning) games, and general having fun.  I still have to pack my armies, label and pack close to 60 items for the auction and consignment store, pack clothes, and do some things around the house.

FSA tourney report

I got to play in an FSA tourney yesterday.  I went in expecting to lose, but that's okay, because I had only played a couple of games of 2nd ed FSA.  I just wanted to get some games in, which is the same expectation that I have for any games at GenCon. My list was dictated mainly by what models I had, and what I was most comfortable with. (Eg, I have a carrier, but haven't tried it yet, so I did not take it.)

I fielded:

Tyrant battleship, with +1" Mv, +2 PD, -1" turn limit
3 Hermes crsuiders, all with +1 shield
3 Artemis destroyers
4 Missionary frigates
4 Armsmen frigates

I faced Ba'Kash and two different Sorylian fleets. The Ba'kash player just rolled over me - his frigates outflanked me, and my torps just could not get to his carrier. (I played poorly, which is part of it, but I was trying to use my cruisers, battleship and destroyers to crack his heavy cruiser, and not having any luck.) I did bad, bad things to the first Sorylian; a combination of lucky dice rolls, and most of his force was either ambush or in reserve, so everything got to shoot at his battleship. I did not kill the BB when I had the chance, and it cost me a couple ships in the end. I also should have spent a battle log point to ensure that my reserves got onto the board on the final turn, instead of letting him have the free points. (Lesson learned).

The second Sorylian player tabled me, and I barely did enough to him to avoid hitting -10 on the battle log. I played passably well, and he said that my fleet wasn't bad - it just needs some tweaks (which I know). My lesson on that game was just how powerful nukes can be.

So, my quick lesson thoughts are:
Buying MARs for extra PD and shields were worth it. That extra shield or PD (or both) kept my ships alive much longer, often being the difference between a crit and just a point, or even taking no damage at all.

Next time, take nukes. They will force the other players to either spread out their fleet, or risk the extra damage. Plus, Terran nukes are cheap.

Remember that you can reroll beam weapons in range band 1. The Tyrant shot at something, and I had a bunch of 1s, commented on it, scooped, and went on. A couple minutes later, with my next squadron, I realized that I could have rerolled those. I might not have done any better, but I sure as hell would not have done any worse.

Terran destroyers are evil. Full stop + hidden killer + maneuverable is bad enough, but if I make the fore weapons into nukes, all I need is a clear firing lane.

The cruisers were kind of meh. I'll try them again, and spend the extra points for nuclear torpedoes.

Missionary frigates did not do much, and were barely useful in hunting down enemy ships with Difficult Target. I need to try shunting them in or bringing them on the flanks as reserve. Armsmen frigates were almost always more useful, and I used their torps to take out Difficult targets with a decent rate of success.

The weekend was a bust

Well, a bust in the sense that I got no games in.  At all.  On the other hand, I spent hours at the FLGS on Saturday, talking about Planetfall and FSA (which is good, because I am hoping to play in an FSA event next Sunday), and helping four players through some games of Warmachine.  These weren't demo games; the players all had 15 point armies, but they were still new to the game, and I was glad to answer questions and offer advice when needed.

I also worked on a couple of 4' x 4' boards for a friend, and got a little painting done, and had time to start reading through the Planetfall rules.  I also think that I have all of my 40k Marines rounded up, so they can go off to Bartertown.  Need to raise some cash for GenCon, and pay for a couple of Kickstarters that I am interested in.  And get some more SAGA models.

It's heeeere

Yeah, my Planetfall stuff arrived today.  Between looking at that, painting, and making some terrain, I had a good evening of hobby time.  I hope to prime my Planetfall stuff (well, some of it) over the weekend, and maybe get some games in tomorrow or Saturday.

So much for a resolution

Been way too busy lately - a wedding, the 4th of July, and family in town have kept me away from any sort of hobby time.  Finally, things are mostly settling down, and tomorrow, I am expecting my starter box of Planetfall to show up on my doorstep.  I have also been building terrain, and, in fact, rather than post anything else here, I am going to go and actually work on my various hobbies.  I have an FSA event I can enter in a bit more than a week, and I think I might want to have some things painted for it.

Quick note on Robotech

Robotech Tactics has been on my mind lately, in part because Palladium has made noises about changing from the current 6mm scale to 15mm scale.  Sure, because that will fix problems.  Except that then price structure, game play, terrain, inter-era compatibility, etc are all thrown out the window.

Anyway, on Beasts of War, they announced that the scale won't be changing. I'm glad the scale isn't changing - I probably would have dumped the game at that point.  I've been putting together a lot of Malifaux minis lately, which has helped put some of the RT stuff back in perspective.  Yan Lo has a goatee - which is separate from the head, and has to be glued on.  One of the Oiran has three pieces for the head - the back, the face, and, in between them, a staple-shaped piece that is part of her hair or something.  Each of those are as annoying as some of the RT models - but I am only doing a couple of them.  The RT models were annoying for a bit, but after four or five Zentradi pods, something clicked and they got easier.  (I'm not saying easy, mind you, just easier.  Still haven't done enough Veritechs for them to get easier though.)

Individually, the RT aren't the worst I have had to put together; it's just the number of them needed that really makes it a problem.